NewNovelist is an excellent piece of software,
designed for novel writing. However, it is
equally useful for writing short stories. Short
stories require a very similar strategy to novel
writing – indeed the question of pace and tempo,
structure and form are even more important in
the short story as there is no margin for fluff
and error.

The key to a great short story includes the
development of convincing characters, a
compelling storyline and tight structure. This
all comes with the assumption that the
manuscript is properly formatted for viewing by
a publisher when finally finished. NewNovelist
writing software can help with all of this
within a short story and more – please see our
overview page for how it can help.

In addition to the points above the following
should be kept in mind for help with writing a
short story:

Have a concise plotline and theme – with a short
story you simply have to get in and out in the
quickest time possible. This basically means
there is no long period for which to develop
your storyline and hence it should be clear and
concise so that the structure and plotting is
effective.

In addition to making your plotline focused,
your characters should be similarly focused.
Make sure you do not have too many characters,
and make the ones that do feature quickly
relevant.

Edit your explanations and expositions – too
much explaining can take up valuable words that
are needed to propel the plot onwards. Whilst a
complex or lyrical description of a character’s
entrance, or living space may be interesting too
many words used can end up making your short
story move towards War & Peace. As a short story
you are writing should follow a similar form so
be conservative with how you explain and present
your scenes, characters and locations.

NewNovelist and Creative WritingCreative writing and learning how to write a novel can be
exceptionally hard. First, you have to learn the basics, then
you have to practice... and practice... and practice. And you also
have to research what makes a successful novel. The vast
majority of novels adopt a basic formula, and we incorporate
these within NewNovelist.

Whilst throughout these additional information pages we have
provided tips and 'how-to' advice, the real gold dust is in our
software program (available on CD or to download). It is based
on tuition from the leading university Creative Writing course
in England (University of East Anglia), and uses templates to
provide you with the structure you might otherwise spend years
researching. These templates can teach you the basics to writing
all different types of novel: crime, mystery, detective,
fantasy, childrens, thrillers, military and many many more. In
short, it provides you with a virtual tutor.

In addition to the template structure, there is context
sensitive help available - advising you on timing, tone and beat
- and scores of examples drawn from modern and classical
literature. For beginners this will be a revelation. For more
experienced writers it provides a welcome refresher.